This year is the 52nd anniversary of Jim Ryun becoming the first high schooler to break four minutes in the mile. Jim Ryun will be there to present the awards for what look to be some great races in Lakeland that a massive 85 teams will be competing in. The meet kicks off with the varsity girls at 7:30 a.m. followed by the varsity boys at 8:00. The JV races start at 8:20 with the middle school races starting an hour later. The AAU race for athletes under the age of nine begin at 10:00. Our virtual meet feature gives us a chance to see how the meet might play out based on season bests from last year. Todd Grasley, Eric Kidd and Billy Simpson will be on-site with LIVE updates photos, race videos, interviews, recaps, results and more!

St. Thomas Aquinas is the best of our boys teams according to our composite rankings which takes into numerous criteria. If you pull up the XC Team Scores page, you'll see a link to "Composite" scoring. This is a type of scoring that gives a team a rank on a number of different categories, with different weights on each.

Creekside and Chiles finished 1-2 at the 3A state meet last year and look to be positioned for the same showing this fall. Creekside will rely on a skilled and experienced senior laden team while the Timberwolves have three runners capable of placing in the top 25. We take a look at the top 10 teams in 3A as we head into the 2016 season.

Caroline Barlow had big plans for her senior season on the track. After finishing second at the 3A Cross Country Finals. Barlow came into 2014 eyeing a 3200m state title, an event she was third in at the state meet. Enter a stress fracture in her right tibia and all dreams ceased. Her dad and coach Paul Barlow informed flrunners.com of the season ending injury. He says with the stress fracture, she just can't train hard enough to make it out of their insanely competitive region.

Sukhi Khosla hadn't run in a ton of meets leading up to Pre-State and hadn't run against a majority of the state's top competition. However, when the time came Khosla dominated running 14:59 and setting a new meet and course record, cementing him as not just one of the top runners in 3A, but in the whole state. Nease senior Karen Xiang was the first runner to dip under 18 minutes going 17:52.20 at the flrunners.com Invitational Race of Champions.

Gulf Coast senior Caroline Barlow spent the beginning of the cross country season, touring the southeast on official college visits. The stops included the University of Florida, Ole Miss, and the University of Alabama. Barlow says she really enjoyed all three of her visits and each school offered wonderful opportunities, but it was Bama that stole her heart at the end of the day.

Gulf Coast senior Caroline Barlow and Land O' Lakes senior Travis Nichols are this week's Athletes of the Week. Barlow had arguably the biggest win of her high school career at the Pre-State/FSU Invitational crossing the line in a new personal best time of 17:53.99, more than six seconds faster than runner-up Emily Edwards. Her time was the second fastest in the state for 2013 behind only Karen Xiang of Nease. Nichols has dropped his times week after week and picked up his fourth win in his last six races. For the second year in a row, he was the Sunshine Athletic Conference Champion, and did so in a new season best time of 15:55.30.

As runners of track and field and cross country and fans of the sport, we are all part of a larger running commity. It is in a time of need, such as the case with Gulf Coast High School runner Elizabeth Roux, that your help is greatly appreciated.

The Gulf Coast girls cross country team finished eighth at the state meet in 2012 with top runner Caroline Barlow crossing the line in fourth place and making the medal stand. The take away from last year was the the team needed to build more depth and bring four through seven further up the finishers list.

Sometimes the relationship between player and coach can get a little complicated if the coach also is your father, but for Gulf Coast cross country runner Caroline Barlow that relationship is all business out on the track. (via Naples Daily News)

The 3A District 12 course is the same modified triple looper around the soccer and baseball fields of North Collier Regional Park that was the site of the inaugural Barron Collier Invite earlier this season. With its deep Bermuda grass, slightly long measure, and redundant trek it has proven to be a tough-to-PR course. That said, the weather conditions on this day were excellent to buck that notion and see some fast times.

In the two years since the last Collier County Athletic Conference cross country meet, things haven't changed much. Gulf Coast's Caroline Barlow and Palmetto Ridge's Carlos Miranda won the individual titles, while the Sharks girls and Naples boys took the team trophies. Exactly like two years ago. (via Naples Daily News)